Chapter 170: A Modest Escape Plan
James worked his way down the last of Kit’s ribs, pressing each one in turn and watching the boy’s face for the little flinch that would tell him more than any word he could presently tell him himself.
Nothing worse than bruising, so far as he could make out.
Halfway through the examination, he stopped and stared at his own hands. They moved with a confidence his head had not authorized and, frankly, had not been consulted about.
A short laugh escaped him, being more breath than laughter.
It seemed the least he could expect was for some of that old training to survive the journey with him, and sure enough, his hands still remembered every damned hour spent learning how to find a sailor’s punctured lung.
He went on with it.
One swollen eyelid came up beneath his thumb, and James watched the pupil react to the room’s poor light with all the speed of a lazy man being asked to work. Then he laid his palm flat against Kit’s belly and pressed, waiting to find the sort of softness that meant trouble.
There was none.
James sat back on his heels and wiped his hands down the stolen coat he was wearing, which accomplished very little except dirtying the coat further.
He shook his head in relief while Jim crouched beside him, waiting for the verdict.
"Here."
James brought up Kit beneath the shoulders and knees, and Jim took the boy at once. He put the boy against his chest with a care no one had never seen before.
"How bad, Cap’n?"
Jim’s voice had none of his customary bluster left in it.
"Bad enough, lucky enough."
James pushed himself upright. "The lad had more bones cracked and more skin cut up through his own reckless nonsense than here. Every bloody time it makes him tougher, so I’ll wager that’s the one habit of his worth keepin’."
Sam came across the room and crouched beside them, Tomás one step behind. Milagros stayed further away from the little gathering, silent.
"Right then."
Sam nodded toward the barred door. "Every forthright way out of this fort has guards on it, and every one of those guards is liable to ask why four soldiers are carryin’ a bloodied, senseless boy and a ragged prisoner with them."
Tomás remained calm. "Besides, soon they will discover the missing soldiers, Captain. Once that happens, I imagine the entire fort will become alert to any impostors or run-away prisoners."
James looked toward the door and started to think of a plan. Habit was a stubborn thing, it kept pondering even after hope had stopped paying the bill.
Tomás raised one hand before the silence had time to become awkward.
"There is another way."
He gestured through the air, as if pointing out a road on a map. "Part of the exterior wall comes close enough to the roofs beyond it that a man could jump the distance. From there, the buildings are packed so close that we could jump through the rooftops toward the docks."
"Hm, it could work. Have you scouted it beforehand?"
"I thought it wise to do so."
James let out a breath that belonged equally to relief and disbelief.
"Bloody hell, Tomás. Remind me never to leave ye behind again."
Tomás looked down at Kit, still limp in Jim’s arms.
"It is the best road we have, Captain. I would not lie to you about that."
James looked back toward the door leading into the fort, toward the dungeon they had passed minutes before, and an idea he had put away finally came due.
He turned back to the others with a grin already spreading across his face, which was a curious thing considering the state of the room and the company in it. "That cell full of pirates and enslaved men, turn every last one of ’em loose, and this whole fort’s got a much bigger problem than some folks movin’ quick across ’em rooftops."
Sam’s mouth turned upward, "Aye, some wee noise, bought cheap, for one chance at gettin’ out of here breathin’. I’ll call that a fair trade any day of the week."
Tomás was already heading for the corridor, his voice certain. "I will go, and then find my way back afterward, by another door or across the roofs themselves."
James nodded toward him, then he turned to the others, "Sam, you’re out front. No disguise in the world is holdin’ up with the rest of us carryin’ Kit like that. Better you’re ahead, findin’ us a safe road, than standin’ beside us tryin’ to explain why we’re escortin’ a bloodied boy and a prisoner at the same time."
Sam had no argument for that. He checked the borrowed blade at his side, made sure it was where his hand expected it to be, and headed for the door.
Before anybody else could follow, Jim caught James by the sleeve. Kit was still cradled against his chest, limp as a sack of flour and considerably more troublesome.
"If I die out there, Cap’n, tell every tavern from here to Tortuga I went down fightin’ twenty men bare-handed."
"I’ll tell ’em ye tripped over yer own boots while runnin’ from some girl’s angry father."
James thumped a hand against his own chest. "And if I’m the one that goes, you lads tell the whole bloody Caribbean I died rich, handsome, and owin’ considerably fewer men money than they think."
Sam called from the doorway without looking back. "I’ll handle the handsome part meself, seein’ as nobody else here is likely to believe it."
Milagros clicked her tongue.
Her turn came, and whatever jokes might have been waiting for it never arrived. When she spoke, the words were plain and unguarded.
"I’ll not apologize for draggin’ the lot of you into this."
She looked from one man to the next, James, Jim, Kit’s slack face over Jim’s shoulder, and the door where Sam already had one hand on the bar. "If we walk out of this fort alive, I’ll owe you a debt I don’t expect to finish paying in this life. That debt is mine to carry, and I’ll not put it on Esperanza and ask her to settle it for me."
That left them with nothing clever.
James reached the door last and put both hands on the bar.
"Right, then."
He looked back at the four of them one last time. Kit’s breath came thin and uneven against Jim’s shoulder. Apart from that, the room was silent. There was no more noise to hide behind.
"Tomás to the dungeon. Sam ahead. The rest of us behind him, and quick as Kit’ll let us."
Beyond the door, the fort was waiting.
There was nothing left now but to walk into it.